The algorithm sucks, Chloë Sevigny, vintage denim hunting, etc.
a Sunday scream of consciousness
(I think I’m 13 here. We were headed to Biloxi, Mississippi on a mission trip. I was obsessed with tattoos, my iPod, and black nails. I invited the entire bus of girls to draw all over me. I think I’ve always had this need to create fun. Everyone had their digital cameras out. We had a blast.)
It’s Sunday after Daylight Savings and I’m in between doom-scrolling and writing the second issue of my zine. A sigh relief that, ah—the looming anxiety of season depression has fallen to the wayside because it is simply here now.
5:15pm: the sun is setting.
Camille Charrière (a muse who stays on rotation in my mind amongst a legendary collection of others like Victoria Legrand, Tish Weinstock, Chloë Sevigny, Devon Aoki, Alexa Chung, Atlanta de Cadenet) posted a story today about the attitude of algorithm: it’s crushing our ability to be interesting and/or develop a sense of self.
And I really resonated with it; my creative abilities have completely depended upon my ability to seek them out independently.
What I mean by this is exactly that: my way of creation has required extensive, continued research. Getting to know yourself uncomfortably. Intimately.
How you examine the world around you (and I mean EVERYTHING), collecting what moves you, chewing it up like a blob of Bubblicious and spitting it back out to get stuck to someone or something, just as these things have stuck to you.
When I wasn’t at school or rehearsal, I would spend hours upon hours on Limewire, Lookbook.nu, Xanga, Myspace, YouTube (Tumblr didn’t find me until 2011) searchpartying the ends of the internet to, sadly I suppose in ways, feel things.
But, not sadly - this was a new exciting wave of accessible art.
Participating in the act of researching music, fashion, writing, the arts, people, photography was always a priority for me.
Likely subconsciously ego-driven and, at times, pick-me energy to others, I have always loved sharing new forms of art I’ve discovered with friends or new people.
Being an only child, I thought the way to connection was sharing cool things with others. I didn’t have any built-in best friends or older siblings to tell me what to listen to or what to wear. To share the cool things, I had to find the cool things.
[“cool things” being the bits & bobs that held the power to yank me out of autopilot.]
I watch a LOT of YouTube interviews of women I admire, and so I recently watched a new interview of Chloë Sevigny reminiscing on her early days as an actor and how she became counterculture’s It Girl:
And so, also, without sounding like a total asshole, I grew up feeling the same way - I think I’ve just always had taste.
Connection was always hard for me, but I do feel my taste & interests have brought so many talented and waaaay cool people into my life. Often intimidatingly, I always liked hanging out with people who were cooler than me. It gave me something to chew on and to learn.
In middle school my two best friends were Korean and Taiwanese. They were soft-spoken and kind, and I always knew they were so much cooler than me.
By 7th grade I was wearing Dior lipgloss, I had fallen in love with Miucca Prada and so we’d upcycle & design our own clothes, I could code my own Xanga layouts, and I prayed to L.A.M.B every night.
Please believe me when I say I really don’t want to do the thing where I’m 32 and morph into an internet curmudgeon over technology & its incredible advancements, but I relate to Camille and Chloë in that…
I do feel there’s some serious downstream effects in being spoon-fed our every want and need.
AND OF COURSE, I have benefitted from the algorithm. You may have even found me from the algorithm! And so I do not want to completely dump on it because it’s not black & white for me.
But I believe it has severely diminished the magic in the exploration of finding what makes you tick. That magic is everything.
It’s like thrifting: sifting through the loads of random shit makes finding that perfect pair of 501s that much sweeter, no?
[By the end of this post, I’m sure to have Levi ads throwing up on every screen I own.]
My favorite things to write about, the juiciest bits, have mostly been through pre-algorithm internet exploration or real life experiences: all my darkest & carefree party days, teenage angst, strange lovers.
There is a subconscious reliance on the algorithm to tell us “what we would probably like” to read, watch, eat, shop, and travel which, if you tend to overthink like me, isn’t so far off from brainwashing…
This is more of a reflection & reminder to myself than anything so future me doesn’t forget it: don’t let the monster eat you up.
Follow your intuition. It will lead you to your truth. To your home. Own it. Share it. Be weird.
And that is so cool.
Xo, Rebs